Balloons and stents for delivery in a bodily vessel are typically matched in length when the balloon is in the uninflated state and the stent is unexpanded. During deployment of the stent, the stent typically shortens and the balloon grows in length. This can result in unnecessary trauma to healthy portions of a bodily vessel as the balloon applies a force to portions of the vessel which do not require stenting.
It would be desirable to provide a balloon and stent which are substantially the same length in the unexpanded state and which, to the extent they foreshorten, are characterized by similar foreshortening rates. It is expected that by matching the length of the stent and the balloon and by matching the foreshortening rates of the two, restenosis may be reduced by reducing the extent to which healthy regions of a vessel are subject to dilation.
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Without limiting the scope of the invention a brief summary of the claimed embodiments of the invention is set forth below. Additional details of the summarized embodiments of the invention and/or additional embodiments of the invention may be found in the Detailed Description of the Invention below.
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